"Atlanta continues to stand out in terms of recent relative
weakness," David Blitzer, chair of S&P
indices, said. "It was down 2.1 percent over the
month, and has fallen by a cumulative
19.7 percent over the last six months. It also posted
the worst annual return, down 14.8
percent."

Atlanta faces a number of constraints that other
metropolitan areas do not, including rampant overbuilding that
has left the market seemingly permanently saturated.

"A lot of those lots are in locations that are not too
desirable and may not ever get absorbed," Eugene James,
director of the Atlanta region for Metrostudy, told
SNL. "I've been trying to figure out some additional, new uses
for some of these lots in these exurban portions of metro
Atlanta. I don't know, maybe we just dump some dirt on top and
start growing trees."